Darth Maul’s Lament, and some Wishful Thinking

Originally published July 2, 1999, in Comics Buyer’s Guide #1337

Assorted observations and ramblings:

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I love the advertising angle that TNT is using for Crusade.

They’re calling it a “Special Limited Series.” Well, yeah: limited in that TNT canceled it before it ever even made it onto the air.

Some folks think that TV series are ruled purely by the almighty Nielsen ratings, but such is not the case. Internecine politics can also kill a series just as dead as low ratings.

Quite simply, the wrong people at TNT decided they didn’t like the show and shut it down. It is amazing to me that executives in such positions don’t realize that their taste should not be the final arbiter of what people see and don’t see. The audiences should be given the opportunity to pass judgment and let that be what decides a series’ fate.

I can’t begin to count the number of times, when I was in sales at Marvel, that we were given a particular comic book or series to sell that simply wasn’t my cuppa. But I didn’t give any less effort to pushing that series than I did any other. Instead I did everything I could to make sure that the intended audience knew the book was out there and bought as many copies as possible. My personal feelings had absolutely nothing to do with anything.

So it bugs the hëll out of me when executives become convinced that their opinion of a creative endeavor’s quality is remotely relevant. Their job should be to hire the best people possible, get out of their way, target the audience and push the series. Period. Not decide ahead of time, “This isn’t how I would do it” and then do everything to kill it based on that.

Wishful Thinking #1: Executives who dislike a series should not fight to kill it.

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Once upon a time—thirty, forty years ago—a comic book would come out on the newsstands. And after a few months, it would be canceled because the numbers and support didn’t seem to be there. Six, seven issues, and then boom. Gone. Problem was, because of the slow and inefficient news stand system, a true picture of the series long-term potential didn’t come into view until nine months after each issue would come out (because they couldn’t make a final determination until they knew what the returns were going to be like). So half a year or more after the kill order had been made, and the series was moldering in its grave, the boys in circulation would get in the return numbers and discover that issues 2, 3, 4 and so on had a spectacular sell through. They could determine that the series was finding its audience and had the potential to be a major hit—except, whoops. All gone.

Now we have the direct sales market firmly in place, and we’re at the other extreme. Rather than being in the situation of decades ago when decisions suffered from too little information, we’re dealing with too much information. Retailers order gingerly on a first issue of a non-returnable book because no one wants to be stuck. But since the orders for the subsequent issues are made without any indicator of how the first issue is going to do, retailers automatically slice their orders. As a consequence, any new series that is a bit novel and quirky (such as the wonderful Vext) or that have a shaky track record in previous incarnations (Nova, which practically arrived DOA, cancelled as of issue seven with issue two barely having hit the stands) are simply not getting a fair shake.

At this point, orders beyond issue #1 are irrelevant. Let’s say a company’s “bottom line” is 35,000 copies. Anything below that is cancellation bait. If orders on issue #1 come in at 40,000, they might as well cancel it right then. Hëll, they shouldn’t even bother to publish it, because by issue #3 or #4, the pattern of order-slicing will doom the series. Like Mr. Andrews explaining why the Titanic couldn’t survive with five compartments breached, it is a “mathematical certainty” that a sinking will occur.

As a consequence, the trigger is pulled on a series that might have been a hit. Anything new and different takes a while to build up an audience, but that time is no longer being given. (In television is a truism that a Cheers or Seinfeld hitting the airwaves now would not make it out of the first season, since both were slow starters.)

Faced with extremes of ordering procedures, perhaps it’s time a blend be developed. It may be that in an effort to try and nurture and protect new series, publishers are going to have to take some extreme steps to get retailers to order them. Retailers, by the same token, are going to want some protection so that they’re not stuck with extra copies. It’s up to the publishers to get behind their books and show some confidence in them.

Perhaps a concentrated and organized overshipping program might be in order, particularly for the first six or seven issues of a new series, with the overshipment being returnable. That way the books are out there and the retailers aren’t stuck with them. Let’s face it, if a retailer eats a book, he’s swallowing a book or so a book, depending upon the retail price and his discount. If a publisher swallows a book, there’s only the manufacturing cost lost, which remains relatively peanuts. For that matter, any returned and unsold books could be donated by publishers to any of the many reading programs throughout the country; potential tax deductions present themselves. Everybody wins.

It would help if executives decided that they liked a series for its long-term potential and fought to keep it alive instead of just letting mathematics crush anything different or interesting.

Wishful Thinking #2: Executives who like a series should fight to keep it.

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Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace spoiler warning (yeah, sure, like you haven’t seen it.)

I summarized the climax of the above film to friends thus: “Darth Mauled Qui-Gon who became All-Gone, but in the end, Obi-Won.”

However, other folks on the net have come up with their own observations and takes on the subject. Jeff Morris was prompted to develop the following charming ditty:

 DARTH MAUL’S LAMENT

(sung to the tune of “Yesterday” by Lennon/McCartney)

 

Yesterday

Both my lower limbs were here to stay

Now it looks as though they’re far away

Oh, I believe in yesterday

 

Suddenly

I’m not half the man I used to be

There’s a Jedi standing over me

His lightsaber hit suddenly

 

Why he made that blow

I don’t know, he wouldn’t say

I killed Qui-Gon Jinn

Now I long for yesterday…

 

Yesterday

I could run and dance and walk and play

Now I need a cart to get away

Oh, I believe in yesterday…

Meantime, editor John Ordover at Pocket Books didn’t quite see the big deal about Darth Maul. “He shows up twice and loses both times. Wow.” Then again, John also had no patience for the Jedi Knights the moment that Qui-Gon calmly said that they had no intention of trying to free the slaves. His belief was that, dammit, by the time James T. Kirk left Tatooine, at the very least he’d have Anakin’s mother in tow. More likely, he would have managed to lead an entire slave revolt and they’d have been running the place, because a hero’s job is to challenge the status quo—particularly when faced with such a heinous one as slavery.

But, to me, the crowning comment came from Ben Varkentine, who observed, “How am I supposed to take Darth Maul seriously as a villain when I’ve already eaten his head as a fruit snack?”

(Peter David, writer of stuff, can be written to at Second Age, Inc., PO Box 239, Bayport, NY 11705.)